(The one holiday of the year where I don't feel bad for blurry images!) ~Mum

Niami DenMother really did not want to deal with drunken antics this year. That's what apprentices were for, right? She could just send Agnor off to do some of the legwork, while she happily harvested bountiful Brewday gardens and crafted. Right?

Wrong.

With much sneezing and snuffling, Agnor apologized and asked for a couple sick days off. "Sorry Mum. I don't want to give anyone this cold, so I'll just rest in my room for a couple days. Oh, and don't forget to check out the new **HONNNNNKKK** ... sorry ... brews, too."

"O' course, lad. Rest up sae ye'll be all set frae Bristlebane day in a few weeks. I'm sure tae need ye then."

A muffled groan and a sneeze were her only response.

"Puir lad. He sounds really sick. Well, I'd best be at it if I have tae do all th' legwork, including brew-sampling, by meself. Hopefully, I'll only have tae take a wee taste o' each o' th' brews." Mum chattered to herself as she readied herself for the day - including a small flask of hangover remedy. "I can hold me liquor, after all, but I'm sure tae run across some other puir soul who needs a helping hand!"

Rather than risk forgetting anything important, she added a small notebook and pen to her packs, along with some snacks, and was off.

~~~~

The next morning, Mum awoke, fully dressed to a horrid racket, a vile taste in her mouth, an absolutely brutal headache, and no memory of the day before. She narrowly missed stepping on the source of the racket when she fell-crawled out of bed.

There was an ogre sleeping on her rug.

A very large ogre.

Snoring loudly enough to wake the neighbors, she was sure.

Since they were both fully clothed, she wasn't going to fret it -- too much -- provided she managed to get her hands on her hangover potion before she wanted to do something rude to stop him from rattling the rafters with every breath.

Several minutes later, she sat at her kitchen table, much restored. Her notebook filled in some of the gaps in her memory, and triggered other memories.

Thus it was that when Agnor entered the kitchen to fix himself breakfast, he was met with a stare that would do a basilisk proud.

Fingernails tapped on the table irritably, with the ogrish SNERRRRRRRKKKKK's from the bedroom adding counterpoint, as Mum waited for him to remove plugs made of beeswax from his ears.

"Sick, were ye?"

"Um, I ... got better?"

"Right. An being newly recovered from a nasty cold, ye decided tae party it up in th' Commonlands wi' some drinking buddies, eh? Then again in Brell's Bar?"

"I ..."

"Did ye think I'd be tae sotted tae remember seeing ye?"

The coldain's eyes flicked downwards. Clearly that had been his hope once he made the mistake of being spotted. Mum might have even written it off to her drunken blurry vision if not for the mention in her notebook, coupled with his guilty face.

After an uncomfortable pauce, he practically tripped over his response. "I'm sorry. I'll make it up to you..."

"Well, lad. Ye've been remarkably well-behaved up until now, sae I cannae begrudge ye a bit o' playing hookey." As he started to relax, Mum held up one finger in warning. "Howe'er, ye picked a bad time tae act up, an' it may just come back tae bite ye."

The look of confusion on his blue face slowly turned into a look of dawning horror as Mum tossed a comment over her shoulder as she left the kitchen. "After all, ye do realize that th' next holiday we have tae research is Bristlebane Day, an' ye've just volunteered tae help me wi' a very special project.

Any neighbors who hand't been kept awake by the snoring ogre were awakened by Agnor's shrill shriek of panic as his imagination ran wild.

I hope nobody got singed!

ALL of them have fleas!

Thundering Steppes jester

Her beard will grow back - right?

New Crafted Recipes

It is time for Brewday 2013, which will run from 12:01 am Pacific on March 7 through 11:59 pm Pacific on March 18.

The 10 new recipes are be from the new Brewday book, Brewday Accoutrements to Craft IV. They will require level 2 to scribe, and be level 10 difficulty. (Books are sold in the Bar of Brell, which can be accessed from New Halas, Kelethin, Gorowyn, Haven, outside the gates to North Qeynos in Antonica, and outside the gates to West Freeport in the Commonlands

Primary ingredienets for these, and for returning recipes from past years are harvested from Bountiful Brewday Gardens. These gardens can be found in Commonlands, Antonica, Greater Faydark, Darklight Wood, Timorous Deep, and Frostfang Sea -- but only when you are wearing the Ale Goggles or Improved Ale Goggles that are a Brewday past/present quest reward. (If you have your goggles from past years, you can wear them. If you are new to the quest, can't find them, or just plain want another set, the quest "Improved Ale Goggles" from inside the Bare of Brell, will reward you with a set.

Bangers and Mash

Blue Luminescent Stone Torch

Green & White Brewday Streamer

Hewn Stone Bench

Hewn Stone Chair

Hewn Stone Table

Plate of Corned Beef & Veggies

Silvery Serving Platter

Silvery Wine Bottle

Stone Ale Jug

New Crafting Achievements

Live events this year introduced new Live Event achievements. Among the Brewday achievements, you will find two crafting achievements. Craft everything on the list and you will be rewarded with the listed furniture item, and you will unlock the ability to buy more of that item from the vendor in the Bar of Brell. Hint: The default size for the quest journal makes these achievement requirements smish together. Widen the window, or use the below screenshots to figure out what they are requesting.

New Quest Reward Furniture

Two returning quests have new house item rewards (other returning quests have new rewards as well, but they are appearance items, petmorph wands, and suchlike, not furniture). There is also one totally new quest, Rummage for Answers, which rewards your choice of one of two house items. (The quest is a once-per deal, so you will want to make use of alts if you want both house items.)

The race on the beach in Butcherblock has a lovely "Bubbling Brewday Fireworks Launcher" (pictured below) option as one of the top race rewards. However, one note of warning, since I didn't catch it until a couple hours before the event went live. The preview for this item looks like the mug on the left. The actual launcher when placed looks like the mug on the right. It is a neat reward, regardless, spewing up bubbles that match the bubbles from crafting achievement rewards, but someone really polished that mug to quite the shiny gleam after the preview shot was done! ;D

Pubcrawling

While the pubcrawling part of the pubcrawling achievement is pretty self-explanatory (once you expand out your achievement window so the text doesn't smush all together), I still feel the need for some explanations/warnings.

If you are a squishy good "lowbie", you may want to do the Moonshine in the Commonlands first. The Freeport guards there are very easy to avoid -- when you are sober. Find the merchant, note the easiest guard-free way out (over the fence and through the water), while you can still see straight, then buy the drink. It will save you from drunkenly trying to flee the guards at an unfair disadvantage.

Why not just sober up, since the red text that hit your chat window when you started your pubcrawl told you that it gave you a sober up ability in your knowledge book? (You DID read the text that came up, right? You are not currently head-desking because you skipped reading it, and are running around looking for a death-free way to sober up?)

The ability will sober you up if you are drunk from the pubcrawl (It is my understanding that it doesn't work on other types of drunkenness). However, you are then so totally sober (and "square"), that you can't have another pubcrawl drink for half an hour. Wimp!